General Magic Inc, the loss making Sunnyvale, California-based company, which last year abandoned its handheld operating systems business to promote its natural language speech recognition technology, said its third quarter’s activities showed improved execution against the new business model. However, third quarter net losses rose to $10.0m against losses this time last year of $4.8m as the company is yet to generate a new revenue stream. Revenues were down by 85% on last year to $374,000, although sequentially, revenues were up from the second quarter’s $91,000. The most significant event in the quarter was the nationwide release of Portico on July 30, said chief executive Steve Markman. The Portico virtual assistant service, hosted by General Magic’s own operations center, gathers, voice, email and fax messages, calendar and address book information in one place for access from a telephone or a browser. Earlier this week (CI No 3,535) General Magic revealed the addition of its magicTalk voice interface (part of the Portico suite) to Intuit Inc’s popular Quicken.com web financial services, allowing business travelers telephone access to these online financial services without the need of a computer. Markman said the Portico service had achieved levels of reliability that signaled its readiness for the influx of millions of Quicken.com users. However, supporting the commercial availability of Portico also pushed up operating expenditure by $2m to $11.9m. The company is now scheduled to announce market trials before the end of the year, it said. The company also confirmed that the previously announced spin-off of its DataRover Mobile Systems company had been completed in the quarter. General Magic retains a 49% stake in its former handheld products division which now operates as an independent company.
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